Preface

Back to Table of Contents Preface to the 64 Basic Types   What this page is a part of. Interpretative Notes to the 64 Basic Types   Read these before reading any of the types!

Implicit in Gittinger's Personality Assessment System are the concepts of divergent and convergent personality clusters. Each of the eight primitive orientations, or original response styles, as defined by the interaction of the three dimensions of the PAS, diverges into eight basic adjustment patterns because of the process of compensation, or lack of compensation, in each dimension. To give only one example, the primitive ERA will fall, at adolescence, into one of the following clusters: era, ef*u* (EuRcAc), ef*a (EuRcAu), ef*u* (EuRcAc), i*ra (EcRuAu), i*ru* (EcRuAc), i*f*a (EcRcAu), or i*f*u* (EcRcAc), depending upon which, if any, of the personality dimensions is compensated. All of these adjustments have something in common because they derive from the primitive ERA orientation, but the nature of compensation is such that the adjustments are really more different than alike, particularly with respect to overt behavior. Each of the other primitive orientations diverges, in a similar way, into its unique set of basic adjustments. The basic adjustment patterns can also be grouped into eight sets of eight convergent clusters, each cluster consisting of those eight patterns defined by the same three letters of the alphabet. That is, to give but a single example, the convergent IFU eluster, or b(ifu), includes the patterns ifu (IuFuUu), ifu* (IuFuAc), if*u*(IuRcAc), i*fu (EcFuUu), i*fu* (EcFuAc), i*f*u (EcRcUu), i*f*u* (EcRcAc). Persons within these convergent elusters may be so similar in external behavior; even though they have different primitive orientation, but they can be called "look-alikes. " These two Appendices of the 1966 Summary (Winne, J.F. A Summary of the Personality Assessment System. Washington, D. C.: Psychological Assessment System Associates, 1966) describe some of the look-alike aspects ofthree separate dimensions making up the PAS personality sphere.

Gittinger's Atlas (Gittinger, J. W. Personality Assessment System. Washington, D. C.: Psychological Assessment Associates, 1964. [2 vol.]) is arranged neither by divergence nor convergence: rather, the descriptions for each level of adjustment follow what might be called the standard PAS order: ERA ...EFU, IRA ... IFU This makes for completeness and for easy location of any specific description, but it does mask much of the dynamic nature of the system. The present paper makes up the major portion of a manuscript that was intended to be a sequel to the 1973 monograph (Winne, JF, & Gittinger, J W, An Introduction To The Personality Assessment System. Journal of Clinical Psychology Monograph Supplement No. 38, April 1973.) But since the reviewers concluded that the system lacked sufficient empirical support, that manuscript was never published. The basic descriptions in this paper are presented in eight sets of convergent clusters. Within each such set, the order is defined by the pattern of compensation coming last.